** What I am doing here is legal, and safe. And done out of pure love of learning about the universe, blame Carl Sagan. Studying rocks, plants, animals and making art and music, building cities . . . all made out of atoms, and the atoms are made up of even smaller things. And its the true lego's of the universe. And the way you get to see and study much of it is via energetic little particles and waves. Radioactive stuff.
You are already surrounded by it in your house and the world around you, and even get irradiated a bit by a person sleeping next to you! Its all about types and amounts.
The kinds of radioactive materials I deal with are primarily Alpha radiation emitters. Alpha radiation doesn't travel far, a few inches of air, a piece of paper, your skin - those all stop Alpha particles. (Its Beta and Gamma particles that are the ones radiating from really dangerous sources which are the worry). The one place Alpha emitters are dangerous are internally, you don't want to eat it. So I am careful not to lick anything on my workbench! Seriously though, I am careful of making dust because I don't want to breath or eat any of such.
This all being said --- DON'T COPY ME! --- I believe I am doing this safely, but certainly I am adding at least a *bit* more risk to my life. So, its dumb, don't do it!